Bike Tour – Tso mori ri (Day 7& 8)

Seventh day we were heading towards the corner which was new to route for me, Tso Mori ri. We had heard a lot about easy track from Leh to Tso mori ri. The road was supposed to be smooth, no high altitude passes, no water streams and no off roading. Keeping all these things in mind we started from leh around 9:00 AM.

To reach Tso Mori ri, we had to head back on Manali Highway until 50 KMs when we had to divert on different direction at Upshi.

The day was sunny and I was feeling the heat to some extent. Untill Upshi we were surrounded by various bikers and vehicles cruising both sides.

As we took diversion from Upshi, the silence of Ladakh deserts took over. There were no vehicles, no man and no life. By seventh day, I was little bored with overflowing silence at most of the places, so did not like the track much. Over and above it, the sun had started bothering me a lot.

Landslide and road construction at one place wasted our half an hour under harsh sun where we saw some people on cabs travelling to/fro Tso mori ri.

The ride was mostly down hill until first 150 kilometres with all kind of curves and terrains. Every turn to the other side of the valley was bringing new mystery of Ladakh deserts and beauty.

Kiari was our first stop of the ride where Military runs a cafeteria named “INDUS CAFETERIA” at an altitude of 13,500 feet.

Soon after we resumed the ride, we reached at one bridge where some water was overflowing onto the road. The continuous flowing water had made the road very rough with some big rocks lying oddly here and there. This was the first fall of my ride wherein I could not balance my bike on one of the rock under front wheel. I tried a lot to balance it but it had to fall gently. Due to low oxygen I could not lift the bike easily and had to struggle a lot as Anand was quite ahead of me. Well this brought some excitement in the day.

Seventh day was only kept for riding and it was feeling little boring quite often. After my fall, we rode continuously for 01:30 hours as there was nothing much interesting to stop. We stopped at village named “Sumdo” wherein an uphill ride again started towards a small pass. Some bikers riding down from the other side brought some signs of life here.

After seeing some bikers and vehicles, an excitement to ride added some energy in me. Hoping that we will stop at the Pass to capture some serene views of Himalayas I pulled the bike hard. However, we did not even realise when we crossed the pass, It happened due to lack of high altitude of this pass.

The pleasant surprise was the view from few kilometre away from Pass. The green water lake was all in front of us. I was wondering as how come the water of Tso mori ri, which is supposed to be blue, has become green. As we moved further towards the lake, the suspense increased. Later we realised that its not Tso mori ri because we were still 30 kilometer behind our destination of the day.

The green water lake was really an amazing gift of nature for tired riders. We relaxed for sometime and opened the map. There we came to know that the amazing green water in front of us is known as Thadsang Lake. Surrounded closely by mountains from all sides, this small lake is an amazing place for camping.

The last 30 kilometers were terribly off road and some of the places were extremely confusing in terms of which direction to go.

As we were nearing our final destination Korzok Village, we got to see the glimpses of Tso mori ri. The lake was widely spread wherever one could see. The calm blue water was real soothing gel for soul. Riding along the lake made me forget the rough roads which we were witnessing for last 30 kilometre.

The view of village Korzok on the bank of lake and numerous camping sites set the whole aura of beautiful life here.

After scouting at few places for shelter, finally we got an amazing camp site near lake. We offloaded our luggage and biking gears immediately, took some refreshment, relaxed for a while. The absence of thump of bullets was making me feel the saturation of extreme silence here.

The time had come to explore the place. We headed towards lake when we had huge argument on our balance days plan. Finally it ended by the time we reached close to the lake.

The amazing beauty of lake was breathtaking. The sunset made the time extremely divine. With handful of people around, the solace made me feel my presence all over. I was roaming on the bank of the lake until darkness had hit the ground.

Such places makes one feel the true meaning of life, which is simplicity. Away from hassles and worries of city life, this place does not feel anything less than a true heaven on earth.

Day 8^th ride was to head back from Tso Mori ri lake to Leh. It did not bring anything new than what we had experienced previous day except the fact that Thadsang Lake where we had seen it completely green had turned blue.